WASHINGTON — The House approved legislation on Wednesday to avert a government shutdown late this month and give the Defense Department more leeway to absorb the spending cuts that went into effect last Friday.

By a vote of 267 to 151, the House sent the Senate a bill to fund the federal government from late March through September. Most Republicans voted for the bill, while a majority of Democrats opposed it.

Rep. Jim Bridenstine, R-Tulsa, was the only House member from Oklahoma who voted against the bill.

Rep. Tom Cole, R-Moore, who battled Democrats on the House floor for the better part of an hour, said the legislation locks in the spending cuts, known as the sequester, that took effect on March 1, but gives the Pentagon and the Department of Veterans Affairs the flexibility to maintain military capability and take care of retired service members.

The legislation gives a boost to the Defense Department's operations and maintenance account. That money is expected to temper some of the effects of the $46 billion in reductions the department must implement through Sept. 30. The department has warned that it would have to furlough most of its 800,000 civilian employees, including 24,000 in Oklahoma, and curtail training and maintenance.

The Senate is expected to approve its own funding bill to keep the government running past March 27 and may use that legislation to help other agencies absorb the cuts that just took effect.

Cole said he hoped the Senate would add other agencies to the bill, but he said Democrats shouldn't have any illusions that the across-the-board cuts would be eliminated. And he said new revenue is “off the table.”

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by Chris Casteel

Washington Bureau

Chris Casteel began working for The Oklahoman's Norman bureau in 1982 while a student at the University of Oklahoma. After covering the police beat, federal courts and the state Legislature in Oklahoma City, he moved to Washington in 1990, where...